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Members of the National Assembly have poked holes in the management of the Sports, Arts and Social Development Fund, which they say is surrounded by secrecy and no transparency.

In a report tabled in the National Assembly, Budget and Appropriations Committee (BAC) chaired by Kieni MP Kanini Kega yesterday, the MPs noted that the uncertainty of the fund had indeed stalled the refurbishment of the seven regional stadia despite the availability of the funding through the fund.

“The criteria, allocation, disbursement and accountability of the Sports, Arts and Social Development Fund funds is unclear,” reads the report. In addition, the committee also regretted that despite the fund being allocated Sh 15.8billion and Sh 6.3billion for the financial year 2022/2023 to support programs under the Universal Health Care (UHC), the details of the said interventions have not been provided.

Sports fund

“There are a number of projects and interventions to support UHC funded by the sports fund. However these projects are not presented to the committee for scrutiny and the budgetary allocation from the fund is presented as a bloc figure,” adds the report.

Following the move, the committee now wants to play a role in the determination of the projects to be funded by the fund in order to enhance accountability.

In the report, the committee directed the board to table the list of the project to be funded by the fund by April 30 each year.

Further, it noted that no new projects should be introduced for funding under the fund within the year after the enactment of the Appropriations act.

“To enhance parliament’s role in oversight of the sports, Arts and social development fund, the sports fund oversight board should present a list of projects to be funded by the fund to parliament for consideration by 30th April each year,” said Kega.

The decision of the committee comes hardly a month after Auditor General Nancy Gathungu in an audit report in April unearthed irregularities in the management of the fund.

Gathungu said the fund had failed to account for Sh8.9 billion disbursements to various sports federations.

The amount includes Sh6.94 billion for the development of sports and Sh1.8 billion for social development including universal health.

Also, Sh218 million for the promotion and development of arts and Sh66 million for monitoring and evaluation.

Gathungu said in the review of the Fund’s accounts as of June 2021 that there were no supporting documents to back the transfers to government agencies and sports organisations.

She said that the Fund did not provide bills of quantities, governing body minutes, designs, approved plans and monitoring and evaluation reports for audit review.